The Learners of Division 13

Ms K Shellard and Ms A Clouston - Grade 2/3 Class

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Encouragement Books

February 3, 2026 / / 0 Comments

Three weeks ago we started our class Encouragement Books.  Each child will have a week where we will be celebrating them!  I am including a photo of Asahi’s brainstorm, An’s front cover of her Encouragement Book and our sentence starters.

As a class, we consistently talk about our feelings and emotions during Community Circle and also include them in our writing.  In this Encouragement Book activity, students are learning to write an encouragement letter to each of their classmates. These letters will include specific details about how each child feels about this student, what types of things they like to do with them and things that they notice about the person.  Ms Clouston and I are very proud of all of the students’ growth in the area of writing. The students are writing beautiful and thoughtful letters to their classmates with specific details. Encourage your child to share their encouragement book with you when they bring it home in the coming months!      

Big Idea: Everyone has a unique story to share

First Peoples Principles of Learning:

  • Learning requires exploration of one’s identity
  • Learning ultimately supports the well-being of the self, the family and the community

Curricular Competencies:

  • Communicate using sentences and most conventions of Canadian spelling, grammar, and punctuation
  • Plan and create a variety of communication forms for different purposes and audiences (ie letters)
  • Create texts to deepen awareness of self, family, and community
  • Recognize the importance of positive relationships in their lives
  • Share ideas, information, personal feelings and knowledge with others

Content:

  • metacognitive strategies and writing processes
  • letter formation and sentence structure

Core Competency: Personal and Social – Positive Personal and Cultural Identity

  • I have pride in who I am. I understand that I am a part of larger communities.

Core Competency: Personal and Social – Social Awareness and Responsibility

  • I support the development of welcoming and inclusive communities, where people feel safe and have a sense of belonging.

Literacy Week

February 3, 2026 / / 0 Comments

Last week Gilmore Community School celebrated Literacy Week!  We read some great books, participated in school wide activities such as Mad Libs, Clothing Scavenger Hunt and had Ms Pitt join our class as our Guest Reader on Friday. On Monday, the author Cathy Hussey spoke to all of the students about her book Doug: The Story of a Tree. In addition, every day at 9:00 there were trivia questions presented to the school and many prizes were awarded. It was a fantastic week for Gilmore! We hope you enjoyed doing the Literacy Week BINGO as a family!

Snowman Art Collage

January 8, 2026 / / 0 Comments

Before the break, the students completed a snowman art collage project. We are hoping for some snow soon! First, we learned to draw a snowman facing to the side using backward “c”‘s. We then learned how to mix paint from lightest (white) to darkest (dark blue) on a plate. We were trying to make our snowmen resemble the snowmen in the book we shared called, Snowmen at Night. The students loved mixing and creating their paint colours. Once the snowmen were dried we used many types of paper to create noses, hats, and scarves. We then used real buttons to make the snowman’s buttons. What amazing artists we have in Div. 13! Ask your child what they like best about their snowman!

Big Idea: Inquiry through the arts creates opportunities for risk taking

First Peoples Principles of Learning:

  • Learning takes patience and time

Curricular Competencies:

  • Explore elements, processes, materials, movements, technologies, tools, and techniques of the arts
  • Develop processes and technical skills in a variety of art forms to refine artistic abilities

Content:

  • elements of design: line, shape, texture, colour, form
  • principles of design: pattern, rhythm, colour and contrast

Core Competency: Creative Thinking

  • Creative growth requires patience, readiness to take risks, and willingness to try new approaches

Learning involved:

  • Students learned the significance of following step-by-step instructions in drawing the sideways facing snowman
  • Students learned how to paint the background using progressively darker colours
  • Students learned how to outline their snowman to make it “pop”
  • Students learned how to add paper  and buttons to finish their snowman designs

Literary Non-fiction Writing

December 3, 2025 / / 0 Comments

For the past two months we have been going to the library every Tuesday to learn about Literary Non-fiction books with Ms Papapanagiotou. Over this time, we have read numerous literary Non-fiction books with titles such as: The Crayon Man: The Inspiring Illustrated Picture Book Biography of the Inventor of Crayola Crayons, by Natascha Biebow, Ivan: The Remarkable True Story of the Shopping Mall Gorilla, by Katherine Applegate, Don’t Trust Fish, by Neil Sharpson, Mister Got to Go: The Cat the Wouldn’t Leave, by Lois Simmie, Flamingos Are Pretty Funky: A (Not So) Serious Guide, by Abi Cushman.  I have attached a book and some information about another book below, so that your child can teach you what Literary Non-fiction books are.

After learning all about Literary Non-fiction and the strategies the authors use that differentiate them from non-fiction books, students brainstormed four things they were “experts” at and some small details about these subjects. We then asked the students to choose the subject they knew the most about or that they thought would make the best Literary Non-fiction book. Three weeks ago, the students began writing their own stories. Rather than simply writing a fiction story, the students know that they have to include facts about their subject. Ask your child about what they are writing about and what strategies they are using to make this story an interesting and creative Literary Non-fiction book.    

Big Idea: Language and story can be a source of creativity and joy

First Peoples Principles of Learning:

  • Learning requires exploration of one’s identity

Curricular Competencies:

  • Plan and create a variety of communication forms for different purposes and audiences (ie Literary Non-fiction text)
  • Create texts to deepen awareness of self, family, and community
  • Use sources of information and prior knowledge to make meaning
  • Share ideas, information, personal feelings and knowledge with others
  • Recognize the structure and elements of story
  • Communicate using sentences and most conventions of Canadian spelling, grammar, and punctuation

Content:

  • learn to use literary elements and devices
  • learn the writing process such as; revising, editing, considering audience

Core Competency: Creative Thinking

  • The capacity for creative thinking expands as individuals increase their range of ideas and concepts to recombine them into new ideas

Flamingos Are Pretty Funky

 

Calendar Routine and Math Learning

November 29, 2025 / / 1 Comment

As a class community, Division 13 has engaged in a daily Calendar routine for 57 days. Each child is responsible for being the leader of this learning activity after watching me, Myla and Sara lead the routine first for a few weeks. There are many Math concepts and life skills that are included as part of the daily calendar routine.  These activities help students practice every day and build their number sense. They apply the date and the daily number of days in school into different formats and math applications. We have also been learning to count by 2’s, 5’s and 10’s to lead us to our 100th day of school, which will occur in February. In addition, we have been learning about the number of the day (today it is 57), place value – 55 = 5 tens and 7 ones, odd and even numbers, graphing using a weather, tooth and days in school graph, greater than/less than, learning numbers divisible by 2’s, 5’s and 10’s, learning addition, subtraction and multiplication.  We also use the number of the day to focus on that number and learn other math concepts about it. Also, the calendar routine provides opportunities for students to practice important skills such as self-regulation, oral language, presenting to their peers and leadership skills.

Big Idea:

  • Collaborative daily routine as a class community provides structure, enhances academic and social skills and increases a sense of belonging for each member of the community.

First Peoples Principles of Learning:

  • Leaning is holistic, reflexive, reflective, experiential, and relational.

Learning Involved:

  • Strengthens overall number sense
  • Patterning, counting, tallying
  • Skip counting by 2s, 5s, 10s
  • Graphing the Weather, Days in School, and Teeth lost
  • Months of the year, Days of the week, Number of days
  • Concepts of Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow (past, present, future)
  • Promotes self-esteem by presenting what you are good at at the end of each Calendar routine
  • Provides students with opportunities to practice leadership and presentation/public speaking skills
  • Enhances self-regulation skills to be an attentive and involved listener when being an audience member and encourages students to be actively involved in their learning by participating

Daily Community Circle

November 27, 2025 / / 0 Comments

Every morning, we engage in “Community Circle” by coming together on our carpet in a circle. The purpose of this activity is; to enhance home-school connection on Mondays (weekend news), encourage story-telling, give opportunity for each member of our classroom community to share their feelings throughout the week, to make connections with each other and to share our weekend plans on Fridays.

The students use the Zones of Regulation when sharing their feelings. They also talk about things they are looking forward to during the day or after school. The person whose turn it is has the right to speak and all others listen actively, quietly and respectfully. Sharing these details help students to build their oral language skills, build their confidence to speak in a way that can be heard by others, share details about their lives and build connections with their peers and teachers. Ask your child what zone(s) they were in today.

Big Ideas (Career Education):

  • Effective collaboration relies on clear, respectful communication
  • Strong communities are the result of being connected to family and community and working together toward common goals

Language Arts:

  • Communicate using sentences
  • Exchange ideas and perspectives to build shared understanding

First Peoples Principles of Learning: 

  • Learning ultimately supports the well-being of the self, the family, the community, the land, the spirits, and the ancestors
  • Learning is embedded in memory, history, and story
  • Learning involves patience and time
  • Learning is holistic, reflexive, reflective, experiential, and relational (focused on connectedness, on reciprocal relationships, and a sense of place)

Curricular Competencies:

  • Identify and appreciate their personal attributes, skills, interests, and accomplishments
  • Recognize the importance of positive relationships in their lives
  • Share ideas, information, personal feelings, and knowledge with others
  • Work respectfully and constructively with others to achieve common goals

Content:

  • Risk-taking – Speak in front of others
  • Cultural and social awareness – achieved by exploring self-identity and acknowledging cultural differences

Core Competencies – Communication:

  • In a safe and supported environment, I respond meaningfully to communication from peers and adults
  • I communicate confidently, using forms and strategies that show attention to my audience and purpose

Core Competencies – Personal and Social:

  • I am aware of different aspects of myself. I can identity people, places, and things that are important to me
  • In familiar settings, I can interact with others and my surroundings respectfully

Gratitude Mobiles

November 21, 2025 / / 0 Comments

As a continuation of our learning about Orange Shirt Day, the students of Division 13 have been learning about what they are all grateful for with Ms Paulich during Indigenous Education lessons. She shared the story The Grateful Book by Angela Kohler and the students had a discussion about all of the things that they are personally grateful for. After brainstorming their huge list together, students then chose the words that meant the most to them. This lesson took place over many days, with the leaves being drawn, the “grateful” words being placed in the leaves, the leaves being painted with watercolour paint, the words being outlined and then the leaves hung on their sticks using pipe cleaners.  Ask your child which mobile is theirs and talk to them about all of the things you are grateful for. In addition, I am including the story that was shared, so that you can share it as a family.

Curricular Competencies:

Big Ideas:

  • Creative expression develops our unique identity and voice

Social Studies:

  • Use Social Studies inquiry processes and skills to ask questions; gather, interpret and analyze ideas; and communicate findings and decisions
  • Recognize the causes and consequences of events, decisions, or developments
  • Make value judgments about events, decisions, or actions and suggest lessons that can be learned

Arts Education:

  • Develop processes and technical skills in a variety of art forms to refine artistic abilities
  • Explore personal experience, community, and culture through arts activities

First Peoples Principles of Learning:

Learning ultimately supports the well-being of the self, the family, the community, the land, the spirits, and the ancestors

  • Learning is holistic, reflexive, reflective, experiential, and relational

Halloween Pumpkin Carving

November 3, 2025 / / 1 Comment

This week, Division 13 brainstormed ideas on how to carve our pumpkin and then voted for our favourite shapes. All of the students helped to carve a part of the pumpkin’s face and then worked to clean out the inside. They did a great job! It was a first time seeing inside a pumpkin for some students! We also got to enjoy the roasted pumpkin seeds during our Halloween movie afternoon. At the end of the day, we did a draw and Jane was the lucky recipient of our group pumpkin. Happy Halloween! We hope you all had a fantastic night of trick-or-treating!

Arts Umbrella Inservice Lesson

October 23, 2025 / / 0 Comments

On Tuesday, Division 13 had an amazing experience with the artists from Arts Umbrella. The theme for our art was Creatures in the Ocean.  Arts Umbrella had massive poster boards covered with real pictures of creatures from the sea. Sarah, the Emily Carr trained artist, taught us how to sketch the creatures using shapes. She spoke about filling our papers up with a variety of sea creatures. She also suggested that some creatures could be in the foreground and others in the background. She also taught us not to worry too much about exactly “perfecting” our sketches, as we could change them once we coloured them in. Like last week’s lesson in class for our art cards, we used pastels, but this time we used oil pastels.  Sarah also spoke about layering colours on top of each other and trying to colour in the entire creature, as we were eventually going to be painting over everything with watercolour (resist). We look forward to sending home the gigantic art next week once all of our paintings have dried (some students finished their watercolour painting today.) Our art turned out amazing and we were so lucky to have had this in-school art experience!

Van Go Arts Umbrella Learning Outcomes:

• Students will make connections between art as a medium to express self, feelings, ideas and experiences, and art as a vehicle for relationship-building with self, others and the world

• Students will create individualized art compositions on paper utilizing oil pastel and watercolour resist, symmetry and balance, and blending

Division 13’s Self Portraits

October 19, 2025 / / 0 Comments

Families: Posting photos has not been working for two weeks, so I am just now able to send you this post.

Our first art lesson involved learning how to draw our faces anatomically. We talked about different shapes of faces, eyes, noses and mouths. We did lots of practice and learning on white boards first. This allowed the students to have a growth mindset, to erase as much as they wanted and to try again. When they were finally given their large piece of paper to complete their final project, the students were much more prepared. Many of the students even fooled their parents with which one was theirs! Well done Division 13! Your self portraits look so realistic!

Big Idea: Inquiry through the arts creates opportunities for risk taking

First Peoples Principles of Learning:

  • Learning takes patience and time

Curricular Competencies:

  • Explore elements, processes, materials, movements, technologies, tools, and techniques of the arts
  • Develop processes and technical skills in a variety of art forms to refine artistic abilities

Content:

  • elements of design: line, shape, texture, colour, form

Core Competency: Creative Thinking

  • Creative growth requires patience, readiness to take risks, and willingness to try new approaches

 

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